The Supreme Court on Friday rapped the CBI for making “disgraceful allegations” in the courts in its plea seeking transfer of cases related to the 2021 post-poll violence outside West Bengal.
A bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Pankaj Mithal said the agency will not speak ill of all judges in West Bengal.
“Mr. Raju, what are the reasons for this? How to remove aspersions from all judges. He shows that there is a hateful place in the whole of West Bengal.
Your employees may not like a particular justice or country but they can say that all judges are useless. District judges and civil judges and sessions judges cannot come here to answer themselves,” the bench told Extra Solicitor General SV Raju, representing the CBI.
Defending the flexibility of the plea, the senior law officer told the high court that there was no intention to criticize and it was a case of frankness.
Raju withdrew the appeal after a scathing hearing in the high court.
The high court wrote in its order that, “Disgraceful allegations have been made in all the general courts in West Bengal. It has been repeatedly denied that there is a hostile environment in the courts. It is very unfortunate that the central agency chose to insult the courts of West Bengal”.
“ASG says there was no intention to insult. However the averment is to the contrary. He is asking for permission to withdraw,” said the bench.
The CBI filed a petition in December 2023 seeking directions to appeal cases outside West Bengal over alleged witness intimidation.
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